


History Lesson

by KtwoNtwo



Series: 2.5 Holmes' [3]
Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers, James Bond - All Media Types, Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Cross-Posted on FanFiction.Net, Not Season/Series 03 Compliant, Other Additional Tags to Be Added
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-24
Updated: 2019-03-06
Packaged: 2019-03-23 11:10:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 20,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13786293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KtwoNtwo/pseuds/KtwoNtwo
Summary: It is said that those who do not know their history are condemned to repeat it.  When the past becomes an all too immediate present, the three Holmes brothers find themselves learning things that were never set down in the history books.A2.5 Holmes'tale,





	1. And There Was Light

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [MIA: Missing in America](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4076104) by [Erif_Of_Taloma](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Erif_Of_Taloma/pseuds/Erif_Of_Taloma). 



The second floor of the Victoria and Albert Museum was quiet.  It was half one in the morning and a strange opalescent glow was emanating from a wall display in Room 62.  The case in question was rather unassuming.  Practically every history museum worldwide had a similar display.  It held a modest collection of rather unremarkable medieval British swords and daggers.  The swords were artistically arranged in fan on the back wall of the case while a number of daggers lined the case’s floor.  According to the plaques provided, the purpose of this particular display was to showcase the variety of weapons available at the time as well as to provide acknowledgement of the donors of each piece.  None of these weapons were particularly valuable.  Most of them had been donations from one member of the peerage or another presumably as a tax write off or to gain wall space in the family seat.  Regardless of their providence none of the weapons should in any way glow but there in the case one sword and its companion dagger were quietly sitting creating their own light.

One would assume that those charged with keeping the various museum artifacts safe would have noticed such a strange occurrence.  One would be wrong.  In fact the guards remained blissfully unaware of these events.  The first guard was a stalwart man who took his job very seriously.  He had already checked and cleared Room 62 sometime before the glowing commenced. 

The second guard, a younger man who had been hired for his technical expertise with alarm systems and cameras, was distracted by a phone call from his girlfriend.  The girlfriend had just arrived home from work as a bartender in one of the classier hotels to find her flat in disarray with the window wide open.  Nothing appeared to have been taken but she was understandably upset.  It took him a few minutes to calm her down and return to his normal duties.  The phone call meant that the younger guard not only missed seeing the glow but also missed the fact that various portions of the security systems seemed to be having intermittent problems.  First the sensor on one of the basement doors read “trouble” for several seconds.  Various cameras fuzzed out in static for thirty to fifty seconds or so before coming back on line.  Finally the alarm on the case in room 62 took itself offline and remained so for a little under a minute.  By the time the first guard had finished his rounds and the second had finished his phone call the glowing sword and dagger were both gone.

It took the museum two whole days to notice the theft due to the fact that the curator for that particular collection had been out sick with a case of food poisoning.  It almost wasn’t discovered at all because the plaques corresponding to the missing items had also been removed.  Only the curator who knew his charges intimately noticed the change and raised the alarm to his superiors. 

Upon discovering the missing items the museum Director called New Scotland Yard who immediately dispatched its burglary unit along with a couple members of its antiquities squad.  The officers took an initial report, made a cursory search and called for a forensics team to check for fingerprints.  It was at this point things became unusual.  

Much to the surprise of the NSY officers the crime scene was suddenly invaded by a number of hard faced men and women who politely indicated that this particular theft was now the remit of a department of the British Government that none of the officers had ever heard of but seemed to be somehow connected to MI5.  After discussion with their superiors the NSY officers ceded control and departed leaving the puzzled V&A staff to deal with a bunch of suited individuals wearing earpieces lead by a drop dead gorgeous woman who seemed to be inordinately focused on her Blackberry.

This new set of investigators closed off room 62 and examined it minutely.  They then proceeded to go over the entire museum with a fine tooth comb questioning everyone and anyone who had been in the building after public hours for the past week.  They also requested to review the overnight security tapes for the same time period.  The review revealed the anomalies in the security system of several days prior resulting in a shift in the focus of the investigation.  After background checks and a thorough interrogation the guards were acquitted of anything more than minor inattentiveness.  The intermittently failing cameras and sensors were removed and replaced and the camera feeds on that night were taken into custody as evidence.

Thus, it was on the morning of the fourth day (third if you take into account that the theft occurred in the wee hours of the morning) after the disappearance of the items that a report along with copies of the surveillance tapes was placed on the desk of a certain minor government official in a rather nondescript office somewhere near Whitehall.


	2. Something Wicked This Way Comes

It was a Friday morning.  I’d had a bit of a lie in since I didn’t have a locum shift scheduled.  Normally on such a day I would have gone down to the sitting room as soon as I awoke but Sherlock had been in one of his moods. He hadn’t really moved much from the sofa and it had been all I could do to get him to eat and drink even minimal amounts.  I figured if he kept it up for another 24 hours I’d need to do something a bit more drastic than just leaving food and drink within arm’s reach and grumbling until he managed to bestir himself and imbibe something.  All of which was why I wasn’t in any hurry to rise from my bed and start the day.  Unfortunately there is only so much lazing about that I can do at any one sitting so I got up, performed my morning ablutions and headed for the kitchen while ignoring the lump on the sofa that was my flat mate.  I had just turned on the kettle when my mobile went off.  It was Lestrade.

“So what’s up with his royal highness?” he asked before I could even say hello.  “Is the prat ignoring me or has something happened?”

“He’s vegetating on the sofa and has been for the last two days,” I replied.

“Sulk or….”

Lestrade was one of the few people who knew that there was a distinct difference between a sulking Sherlock and one flattened by ennui.  The latter condition was more concerning because it tended to result in bullet holes in walls, strange experiments or something that in a normal person might be considered depression.  Sherlock had in the past avoided the dreaded depressed state by use of controlled substances.  Lestrade was right to be concerned. 

“I suspect he’s just…”

“Bored,” a tired sounding baritone interrupted from the direction of the sitting room.

“I heard that.  If he’s so bored why won’t he respond to my texts?” Lestrade asked.

I didn’t know what exactly to tell him.  Luckily I didn’t have to say anything.

“I’ve got three bodies in a locked room, lots of blood, a sword and what looks to be a mangled set of tent poles.  Think you could get him to come take a look?” 

“Three bloody bodies in a locked room for how long?”  I asked aloud knowing that despite his statement Sherlock was listening.

“At least a day, maybe more.  Things are starting to get ripe.”

“And what the heck do tent poles and a sword have to do with anything?”

“Got me mate.”

I noticed movement out of the corner of my eye.  Sherlock was standing in the kitchen doorway.  I cocked my head asking without saying anything.  Sherlock rolled his eyes then turned presumably heading toward the loo.

“Given me the address and about 45 minutes,” I said then added, “And I hope it’s as good as it looks to you otherwise we may have a problem.”

“Roger,” Lestrade acknowledged then provided me the address of a warehouse in one of Greater London’s seedier industrial areas.

We actually made it to the crime scene about 50 minutes after Lestrade’s call.  This was in part due to the argument over food.  I finally had to point out that fainting in front of the fine officers of the MET was not only embarrassing but also a good way to destroy relevant evidence.  Only then did Sherlock deign to eat a couple pieces of toast with honey and gulp down a cup of tea.  We would have been much later but for Sherlock’s quasi-magical ability to not only summon a cab out of nowhere but also acquire one with a driver who actually knew the meaning of haste.

When we disembarked at the warehouse the constable on the door indicated that we’d find Lestrade on the second floor near the back.  The warehouse layout appeared to be typical of its age; three stories with a high ceiling ground floor, small overlooking first floor and presumably a set of office type rooms on the second.  As we headed for the stairway I noticed a team from forensics over by the loading dock.  Sherlock dismissed them with a glance focused instead on finding the stairs.  I knew from the way his eyes were flicking about that his apparent distraction was nothing of the sort and he was cataloging all sorts of information for later use.

We went up the stairs.  Sally Donavan was standing on the first floor landing leaning slightly against the wall.  She straightened up when she saw us but instead of making a snide comment she merely waived us on.  Sherlock quickly looked her up and down but seemed content to honor her détente and didn’t say anything.  We kept climbing.

Sherlock opened the door off the second floor landing and swept through in his usual fashion.  I followed only to encounter a rather specific odor.  My treasonous brain then helpfully supplied the memory of when I had last encountered that particular smell.  Suddenly I was once again standing on the sands of Afghanistan preparing to enter yet another house.  It had been a horrific scene.  Some group, we suspected the Taliban, had slaughtered an entire village right down to the children.  It was clear that after the first couple houses they had eschewed using bullets for the most part and switched to bladed weapons.  We had arrived less than 24 hours after the events but still the stench of blood and flesh just beginning to decompose was etched in my memory.  A hand landed on my shoulder and I blinked.  Sherlock was standing directly in front of me.  I could tell he was deducing and I steeled myself for whatever he was going to say. 

He cocked his head at me and said, “I have always found it amazing that of all the senses people tend to discount the sense of smell.  Not only is it an integral part of taste it is also the sense with the closest relation to memory and emotion.”

He then took off his scarf and proceeded to wrap it around my neck, neatly tucking the ends into my jacket.  He took another close look at my face then nodded to himself in satisfaction while turning away.  He strode down the hall and around the corner leaving me to recover my wits and follow.

I cleared the corner just in time to see Sherlock pause in an open doorway almost at the end of the hall before entering.  I’m not quite sure what I was expecting but it was not a series of offices that clearly had been retrofitted into a flat like configuration.  The main room that opened off the hall seemed to be a sitting room kitchen combination but there were sleeping bags on the floor in addition to a battered dining room set.  There were a couple of doors that presumably lead to bedrooms.  The strange thing about them was that the hinges to those doors had been modified to have the pins on the side of the sitting room.  I didn’t like the implications of that one bit.

Lestrade was standing in the middle of the room watching Sherlock who was now standing stock still in one of the bedroom doorways.  When I got close enough to see in I realized why.  As Lestrade had said there were three bodies, an awful lot of blood, a pile of mangled light weight poles and a sword stuck in the wall.  What he hadn’t described was the position of the bodies and the sheet tacked up to one wall with a blanket folded as a pad in front of it.  I’d seen that sort of set up too many times before not to know what it was.  All of which meant that the mangled poles were most likely a tripod for a camera and the scimitar in the wall had been intended for an execution.  Clearly something had not gone according to plan.

“I see why you called me,” Sherlock said to Lestrade. 

“The camera boys have been through,” Lestrade replied unnecessarily given the little yellow tent like numbers that were scattered all over the room.  He added, “No samples have been taken yet so if you see something new drop a number on it for me.” 

He handed me a pile of the yellow cards.  I stuffed them in my coat pocket and took a deep breath preparing to enter the room.  The scarf proved its worth right then and there because instead of getting the full impact of the smell I got mostly Sherlock; a combination of expensive body wash, poncy hair product and something else that was completely him.

Sherlock by this point was standing in the middle of the room, eyes darting everywhere as he turned his head.  When he focused on me he jerked his chin in the direction of one of the bodies.  I knew my cue.

I examined the bodies one by one.  Since I was not going to touch or move the bodies I couldn’t see all the wounds.  What I saw was enough.  By the time I stood up and took another look around the room I had a pretty good idea as to what I was going to say.  Sherlock was currently examining the scimitar that was stuck in the wall.  My movement alerted him and he looked at me questioningly.

“Where’s the other body?” I asked Lestrade rather than acknowledging Sherlock’s unasked question.

“What you see is what you get,” he responded from the doorway.

“Hmph,” Sherlock acknowledged the information with a grunt as his eyes went to a particularly large and sticky patch of blood.  “Caused by the sword?” he asked.

“I’d have to see the nonexistent body but I would suspect so given the other three.”

That remark earned me Sherlock’s full attention.  I belatedly realized he’d been asking about the other bodies rather than the missing one.  I figured I’d better explain.

“Body number one,” I indicated the body closest to the door, “was hit with the scimitar at least once; most likely by accident given the angle and depth of the cut.  The fatal blow, however, was caused by a straight edged blade rather than a curved one so the scimitar is not the correct weapon.  This is also true of body number two,” I indicated the one in the middle of the room before looking down at the body nearest the scimitar stuck in the wall.  “Now this fellow was dispatched by a strategic strike to the liver with a relatively short blade, eight to ten inches or so in length.”

I looked around then.  Lestrade was staring at me as if I had two heads but Sherlock was clearly integrating the information into his deductions. 

“Any idea on the type of weapon?” he asked me.

I shrugged, “Medieval sword and dagger combination.  Probably an early one since the blade was heavier and wider than normal.  It was wielded by someone who knew how to use it.  Those wounds were not made by just picking it up and flailing around.  The blows were precisely placed and designed to kill.”

“What the…” Lestrade sputtered, “How the hell do you know all that John?”

“Three words Greg; bored American Marines,” I paused then added, “I’ve stitched up similar wounds although not as serious from sparring accidents.  The Marines were good at it but whoever did this was an expert.”

Sherlock was grinning.

“So we have a killer with a sword and dagger who ran off with a dead body leaving the room locked behind him?” Lestrade was sounding frustrated.

“There were only four people in the room,” Sherlock stated, “You’ll be able to verify with foot and fingerprints.  It’s obvious that they were going to film an execution,” he waived his hand vaguely at the sheet/blanket pad set up and the mangled tripod.  “The victim managed to get free, grab a weapon and proceeded to kill his captors before bleeding out over there.  You can observe the indent of the body faintly in the carpet.  Your victim was male, about your height and right handed.  He was quite fit and as John indicated a master swordsman.  I suggest that you pursue that angle.  Look for a group or a dojo using medieval weaponry.  One doesn’t gain mastery of that sort of weapon without a lot of practice.”

“Society for Creative Anachronism and reenactment groups might be a better place to start,” I chimed in.  “They teach that sort of stuff.  If the guy was as good as it looks like then he’d be known.”

Sherlock used my interjection to look at Lestrade intently. 

“You figured out most of this already although you had the scimitar as the murder weapon and more people involved in the fight,” his eyes narrowed slightly.  What you need to know is who came and collected the victim’s body, grabbed the camera and the sword, then locked the door from the inside.”

“And for that matter how they locked the door from the inside!” Lestrade grumbled.

“That’s obvious,” Sherlock said offhandedly, “the bolt was thrown by a small mammal, probably a monkey, who got out of the room there.” 

Sherlock pointed at one of the many air vents near the ceiling that didn’t have a grate or a register on it.  He then walked over to the wall under the vent and peered at several smudges.  A quick look at the carpet with his pocket magnifying glass completed his examination.  He straightened clearly frustrated that the aforementioned small mammal had not left hair or a clear print to aid in identification. 

He glanced around again then continued, “No, what makes this more interesting is the missing body.  The body was removed relatively quickly given the indentations in the stains on the floor.” 

“What would someone want with a dead body?”  Lestrade asked then realizing just who he was talking to, added, “besides you.”

I could think of a variety of uses for a freshly dead body ranging from the prosaic to the bizarre some of which would require expeditious removal to avoid decomposition.  I’d seen a lot of strange stuff whilst trailing along after Sherlock but I really couldn’t imagine why someone would go to so much trouble to lock the door after removing the body.  Given the neighborhood and the nature of the building odds were quite good that the crime scene would have only been discovered by chance.  Judging from the setup of the other room our dead men had already been squatting in the building for a week or more without being discovered.

“Unimportant,” Sherlock waived his hand as he moved over and squatted down next to the body midway between the door and the wall. 

“Nothing as prosaic as an ID on these three?” I asked Lestrade.

“Nope.  Not that we could find.  We are still searching the rest of the building but I’m not holding my breath.  Any assistance on that front would be appreciated.”

Sherlock grunted in acknowledgement then stood and moved to the body closest to the door squatting again to examine the remains more closely.  Lestrade and I watched until Sherlock made that little _hah_ noise which meant that he’d reached the end of a chain of reasoning.  He stood up stretching a bit and settling his coat. 

“This man is from the midlands originally.  If you don’t have his prints locally check Birmingham before running a countrywide search.  I suspect you’ll find a variety of assault charges and an old association one gang or another.  There won’t be anything recent though as he’s moved up a notch or two in whatever criminal enterprise he was associated with.  He’s gone from being just muscle to something a bit higher on the food chain.”

Lestrade raised an eyebrow.

“Really,” Sherlock scoffed, “even you can see the spot on his arm where he’s had a tattoo removed.  That level of removal requires laser treatment and is not cheap.  Given the way it looks the last treatment was over six months ago.  Add that to the state of his clothing and the newness of his trainers indicate that he’s had an upturn in his finances over the last year.  Now where else do you suggest would a midland’s brawler from the council flats, look at his teeth, get the necessary funds?  Did he win a lottery?  No, it was more likely a promotion to something that requires a more presentable appearance as well as providing an increase in disposable income.” 

Lestrade looked a little sour at that but jotted down the pertinent information in his notebook.

“Now,” Sherlock turned to look back at the other two bodies without pausing, “these two are much more interesting.  Despite his size and musculature,” Sherlock indicated the body in the middle of the room, “this gentleman spent an inordinate amount of time at a keyboard.  Judging from his skin color and the design stamped on the back of the religious amulet around his neck he’s originally from Sub-Saharan Africa but has spent at least the last seven years in a much colder climate.  He practices a martial art for exercise, one of the kicking, striking variety, most likely a Karate variant, rather than grappling judging by his musculature.  He also hasn’t been at it very long or isn’t very diligent judging by the level of bruising and calluses.  He has spent some time recently in North America.  That style and brand of shoe are not readily available here and expensive enough to warrant trying them on as opposed to mail order.”  Sherlock inclined his head at the final body across the room.  “Expert fighter in several martial disciplines including one that focuses on a weapon, probably not a sword judging from the calluses again.  Also has spent time in North America recently, clothing and watch, commonly carries a mobile in his right front trouser pocket but didn’t have it on him otherwise you would have mentioned it earlier.”

“That it?” Lestrade asked while still scribbling.

“Until I see the autopsy results,” Sherlock responded.  “Do send them along when you get them.”

“You want to go over the rest of the building?” Lestrade asked closing his notebook.

“I doubt there is anything of import,” Sherlock replied.  “They were relatively smart.  They didn’t use any of the other rooms on this floor for fear of alerting someone that the building wasn’t as vacant as it appeared.  The offices overlooking the warehouse floor have windows visible from the street so they avoided them also.  The main floor does not have any defensible space.  This building doesn’t have a bin but they disposed of their rubbish quite a few blocks away judging from the mud on the local’s feet.”

“Right,” Lestrade grumbled, “if they were so smart how did whomever took the body find them or do you think our body snatchers are unrelated to those three?”

Sherlock shrugged, “It is an error to theorize without data Lestrade.  You know my methods.”

I in the meantime was edging around the discussion heading for the door into the hall.  For some reason, probably bits and pieces of errant memory, the crime scene was making me feel uneasy. 

“Well then,” Sherlock said as I moved a bit closer to the hallway, “you don’t need me anymore unless of course you find the lorry.”

“What lorry?”

“The lorry that they used to transport their prisoner of course,” Sherlock replied.  “You surely don’t think he walked here on his own?”

“But…”

“No trash on the loading dock but debris inside the building indicating that the roller door has been opened recently.  The loading dock is high enough so that you wouldn’t want to heave anything heavy up from either the ground or a boot ergo a lorry.”

And, I thought to myself, a locked and barred side door that clearly hadn’t been used in years.  I had noticed it on the way in, probably at the same time Sherlock had been taking note of the loading area.  By this time I was almost to the door but Sherlock beat me to it by whirling suddenly as soon as he finished speaking and striding into the hall. 

He paused for a moment in the doorway to look over his shoulder and ask “Coming John?”

I was only too ready to grunt in agreement and trail off in his wake.  This, of course, was why I found myself less than twenty minutes later moving the furniture in the sitting room of 221B whilst Sherlock was downstairs raiding Mrs. Hudson’s broom closet. 

“No not there John,” Sherlock said from the doorway holding just the handle from the push broom that Mrs. Hudson used to sweep her back stoop.  “Turn the sofa around and put the back in line with the edge of the fireplace.”

I did as he said.  He in turn propped the broom handle against the wall and then proceeded to clear the floor between the sofa and the door by the simple expedient of dumping most of the detritus onto the newly rearranged sofa.  Judging from the amount of space he had cleared I had a good idea what he was doing especially when he grabbed the broom handle again and handed me an umbrella.  He looked around one more time then snatched up the union jack pillow and deposited it on the hearth. 

“Stand there.” Sherlock indicated a spot to the right of the pillow.  “Hold the umbrella in your right hand.” 

I obeyed as he sank to his knees on the pillow. 

After a minor amount of fussing with the placement of the broom handle he looked up at me and said, “Take a swing at the back of my neck if you please.”

I didn’t really care for the images this exercise invoked but I did it anyway.  Over the next forty-five minutes or so we ranged all over the cleared area thrusting, counter thrusting, swinging and blocking with our improvised weapons.  By the time Sherlock called a halt I knew two things:  one was that my shoulder was going to be extremely sore tomorrow and the other was that Sherlock had not got the information he had been looking for from the exercise.

I deposited the umbrella in the stand by the door then pulled my chair back to its usual position.  I turned back to continue reassembling the sitting room only to be handed a bag of frozen lima beans. 

“Sit,” Sherlock nodded at my chair and to my surprise he started moving the furniture and placing articles back into their proper places. 

“So, other than reconstructing the fight would you care to enlighten me as to what we were doing?” I asked.

Sherlock looked over from where he was replacing a couple of books that had been on the coffee table into the bookcase. 

“Primarily the fight,” he replied, “but there’s something off with the angle of the wounds and the way the bodies were laying.”

I had to smile.  For once I was ahead of Sherlock.

“You are forgetting something,” I said.

Sherlock stopped and raised an eyebrow.

“Two somethings actually,” I continued as another thought occurred to me.  “While your broom handle was the correct length it doesn’t have the right weight to stand in for our missing weapon.  You also didn’t factor in the offhand dagger.”  I cocked my head at him, “I bet you learned epee at school.  They are a lot lighter than the older weaponry and the rules are much different.  Even saber would have helped much.  When you are dealing with something that much heavier the forms are different or at least that’s what I’ve been told.”

“Hmph,” Sherlock grunted as he turned back to his self-appointed task of straightening the room.  “Your bored American Marines again I presume?”

“It was an interesting three months.”

It didn’t take long before the room was back to normal.  Sherlock’s behavior however was not.  I fully expected him to lay on the sofa and then retreat to his mind palace to think.  Instead he went to the kitchen and returned shortly with a cup of tea and a hot water bottle both of which he handed to me in exchange for the now not quite frozen veggies.  He went back to the kitchen and returned with his own cup of tea.  I couldn’t help staring. 

“Not enough data yet,” he said in response to my unasked question.  “This has all the hallmarks of being a long and complex case.  It behooves me to pace myself especially in the early stages.” 

“Ah,” I said not quite understanding.  He had done similar things before but not ever at the commencement of a case.  Usually he would consent, abet grudgingly, to slow down when the leads got few and far between and we were waiting for information but never before had he done so at such an early stage.  What, I wondered, had convinced him to wait for the first influx of data rather than going out and attempting to wrest it by force from wherever it had been hidden.  Once again Sherlock read my mind or maybe he deduced it from my face, the way I was sitting in my chair or some combination of both.  

“By the pricking of my thumbs,” was all he said in response to my unasked question.


	3. Enemy Action?

Morning in Q-Branch on a normal day was only differentiated from the middle of the night by the number of folks working in the bullpen.  Of course this was different during high threat levels or important missions in different time zones but we’d been in so called _normal operations_ mode for a bit over a week.  This was why I was standing at my work station teasing apart a particularly nasty little computer virus which had been caught by the firewall. 

I was just about finished when the ambient noise level in the room suddenly dropped.  That meant one of two things; either a member of management or a 00 on a post mission adrenaline high had entered the branch.  I knew Mallory and Tanner were not in the building and 007 had returned late last night.  I knew that none of other 00’s were even in the same time zone so therefore I looked up from my coding.

I was surprised to observe my brother Mycroft sauntering across the branch floor umbrella, as always, in hand.  One of these days I was going to have to steal it and see if it did indeed contain a blade in the shaft as I suspected it did.  Given Mycroft’s history and experience however it could just as well be a single shot pistol or even a rifle.  I wouldn’t be able to tell unless I got my hands on it.  As he moved closer I got a better look at his face.  He was worried and worse yet he was letting me see that he was worried.  That meant the situation was, as John Watson liked say, _a bit not good_.

In my brother’s wake I noticed a subtle exodus of unessential minions from the main room.  Anyone who didn’t absolutely have to be in the bullpen was finding an excuse to make themselves scarce.  Those that remained seemed to all have sprouted earphones or headsets.  One of the side effects of my kidnapping had been that most members of the branch now knew that Mycroft and Sherlock Holmes were my brothers.  They also knew that if that particular familial connection was ever leaked Sherlock would deduce the source and Mycroft would rain down retribution.  Of course that was only if I didn’t figure it out first and enact my own revenge on the offending party. 

The denizens of Q branch were anything but stupid.  What you didn’t hear you couldn’t leak even inadvertently.  All of which meant that by the time Mycroft reached my workstation we could have as private a conversation as one that occurred in my office.  What remained to be seen was if the situation was high level enough to require additional security.

“Q,” Mycroft acknowledged my title before he moved up onto the platform containing my workstation.

“Mr. Holmes,” I replied just in case anyone happened to still be listening.

Mycroft placed a large yellow mailing envelope on my desk.  He inclined his head at it meaning _The contents should explain themselves_.

I raised my eyebrows, looked puzzled and inquired mutely, _Why do you bring this to me?_

He sighed and his shoulders dropped slightly, _Because none of my people can deal with this._

I brushed my fingers lightly across my keyboard, _How important is this and how fast do you need it?_

He dropped his habitual mask and I could see his apprehension.  He was concerned but was unsure just how worried he needed to be.  He also had no clue as to the next action he needed to take or if any action at all was necessary.  I had rarely in my life seen him this unsure.  He schooled his face again.

I laced my hands together and rested my chin on my extended index fingers, _Can Sherlock help?_

He rolled his eyes slightly, _I’m not sure his talents are appropriate in this situation._

I glanced around the bullpen considering which missions were active and if any of them needed my complete attention.

Mycroft cleared his throat, _I’m not asking you to leave your agents in the lurch._

I smiled slightly, _As if I would for anything less than a national crisis._   Before he could respond I touched the envelope lightly.  _I’ll get on it and let you know what I find._

He nodded fractionally, _Thank you little brother._ Then he turned and strolled unhurriedly out of the branch. 

I looked again at the unassuming envelope then decided to finish up what Mycroft had interrupted before looking at his problem.  It didn’t take me very long to determine that the virus author, who was already on our watch list, had made the jump from scrip-kiddie to journeyman hacker.  I upped his threat level then on a hunch added a note to see if we could locate him.  Well, I reminded myself, the hacker could be a her but statistically this type was more likely to be male so I paused and decided that I’d continue using the male pronoun until otherwise notified.  If he kept going at this rate he’d be good enough to be dangerous in a year or so and I’d prefer to have _eyes on_ well before that happened.  Who knows he might be a potential recruit as an asset, agent or even Q branch staffer.  I also sent a note to Spider indicating that he needed to leak the virus parameters to one or more of the software security companies so that they could take precautions before this one ended up in wide circulation.  Task complete I shutdown my work station, grabbed the envelope and headed for my office.

I opened my locked office door only to find a slightly battered 007 asleep on my sofa.  00’s coming down off a mission, injured or not, tended to behave like wounded animals.  They’d find a secure den and hide until they were fit, fit to live with or both.  Lately that den seemed to be either in my vicinity or somewhere they knew I, and only I, could watch.  I’m not quite sure when it had happened but sometime over the last year those most dangerous, paranoid and damaged group of assassins had decided _en masse_ that I meant both _safe_ and _home_. 

Bond didn’t even twitch as I quietly shut the door.  If it had been anyone else he’d have been up and combat ready in a heartbeat or two.  I took a quick glance at his recumbent form careful not to stare which would cause him to wake  Judging from his muscle tone, breathing pattern and heart rate he was going to be out for at least another 3 hours.  I moved normally to my desk, knowing that stealth would also trigger wakefulness, and started in on what Mycroft had given me.

An indeterminate amount of time later James Bond’s voice asked, “Why are you messing with the V&A’s security systems?”

I wasn’t terribly surprised that Bond had recognized that I was working on a security system schematic.  I was interested that he’d managed to recognize the particular museum solely from the floor plan.  Then again this was Bond, a man who could identify a map of subterranean London with a single glance.  God only knew what other strange bits of information he had stored in his brain.

“Because they had a break in a couple of days ago and some artifacts went missing,” I replied.

“Isn’t that a bit below your pay grade?”

“Not when the thieves had something that intermittently jammed security sensors and cameras selectively.”

“Some of the gear you’ve designed does that.” 

“Our stuff don’t produce this sort of result,” I looked up at him and added, “and I don’t know anyone else’s that would act like this either.”

“So how did they go in?” Bond asked.

I proceeded to show him the series of sensor and camera failures in sequence.

“Well it looks like they only knew the general location of what they were after,” was Bond’s initial comment on viewing the sequence.  He paused for a moment then added, “If I knew that my target was in Room 62 I’d have gone this way.”  He indicated a path with his finger, “unless…” 

I cocked my head at him.  Bond was clearly seeing something that I had missed. 

“Can you display by sensor type?” he asked.

Mycroft’s people had superimposed the security schematics over the generic floor plan map of the museum.  The resulting CAD file originally only had a few layers; cameras on one, sensors on another and the floor plan on the third.  His people had helpfully linked the camera feeds and sensor error messages to appropriate icons on the map.  After I’d reviewed all the files I’d spent most of the last few hours adding additional layers and cross referencing various notes and technical information to particular sensors and cameras.  

 “What ones do you want?”

 “The unaffected motion sensors to start with.”

 A few clicks and the indicated sensors were highlighted in green.

 “Do you have coverage areas mapped for those motion sensors?”

 I hadn’t done that yet but given the technical specifications available I could make an educated guess.  It wasn’t too hard to fill in the appropriate coverage area in a lighter green shading using a new layer of the map program.  I started with the ones along the path that the thieves took. 

 “This is just a rough estimate,” I said as I continued to add areas for motion sensors along the route Bond had indicated.  “If I really want to be accurate I’d need to have someone go determine the exact coverage of each sensor and figure out if there are any obscuring artifacts or displays.”

 “Hmmm,” Bond was intently looking at the display over my shoulder.  “What do you want to bet that there is something obscuring the sensors here, here, and here?”

 I looked where he had indicated. 

 “I wouldn’t take that bet.”

 It only took a few clicks to bring up the camera feed I had for one of the indicated rooms.  I froze the picture before the camera feed had started to be disrupted.  Sure enough there was a large armoire with a decorative top blocking part of the motion sensor’s field of view. 

 “And here?” Bond pointed at a room on his preferred path.

 It took a little searching.  I had all of the camera feeds for the entire museum within an hour or so of the event but Mycroft’s people had only linked the video from cameras that had been jammed.  When I finally located it the result was a clear line of sight for the motion detector. 

 “I retract my initial statement,” Bond said flatly.  “They knew exactly where they were going and had an intimate knowledge of the security in place.  This is your level of intel Q.”

He was right.  This was the detail that I liked to give the 00’s if it was available and we had time to compile it.  Whomever it was had taken the most direct path to room 62 while avoiding all the motion sensors with a clear field of view. 

“So whatever technology they had doesn’t work on motion sensors.  Interesting.”

My brain was running in circles attempting to ferret out a design with as limited a range as indicated by the failures which worked well on cameras, door and cabinet sensors but not motion detectors.  As I was thinking Bond reached around me and commandeered the mouse.  I started to move out of his way only to find that he’d neatly hedged me in, one hand resting on the edge of the desk while he worked the computer with the other hand.  I wasn’t quite sure what to do but my body reflexively relaxed into the almost embrace.  It seemed that subconsciously I associated 007 with security.  Now wasn’t that interesting.  I shouldn’t have been surprised given the fact that 007 had taken it upon himself to be part of not only my rescue but also my recovery from the kidnapping incident _._  

Bond stopped looking at sensor specifications and moved back.  For some strange reason I felt a little disappointed.

“If you exclude the cameras,” he remarked, “the only sensor that couldn’t be overcome with something as simple as a magnet was the one on the outside door.”

I had a thought and brought up the repair history of that sensor.  As I had remembered, that sensor had been swapped out the very next day after the break-in due to failure to reset properly. 

“Thank you 007.”

“So what are you going to investigate next?” he asked.

“I’m going to link all the camera feeds from the rooms next to the path they used and see if there is anything to see.”

I half expected Bond to ask why I would be doing such menial work as opposed to assigning it to one of my minions.  The answer, of course, would have been security.  The real answer was that I wasn’t comfortable given Mycroft’s demeanor with letting this information out of my direct control.

“Ah,” Bond said instead, “Shadows, reflections in surfaces and the like.”

“If I’m lucky I might catch a reflection which I can digitally enhance,” I replied.

“I’ll leave you to that.”

Bond stretched then moved to the sofa reaching down to grab something on the floor.  At that point I realized the man was barefoot lacking even socks.  For some strange reason it struck me as even more intimate than applying plasters or bandages to his half-naked form; a task which I had performed more than once.  I blushed and was thankful for the dim light in my office.  It might just hide my reaction.  Bond sauntered toward the door, detouring slightly to run a finger across the back of my neck.  I heard him chuckle under his breath.  Crap.  I’d been caught.  There was nothing else I could do.  I turned my full attention to the task at hand.

“Don’t work too hard Q,” his voice held a hint of a smile as he exited. 

A bit later as I finished looking at a camera feed I grabbed my mug and took a sip.  Perfect.  I made a mental note to figure out which of my staff had managed to get my tea exactly right.  That was when my brain reminded me of my current location.  I was in my office, working on a classified project. Tea should not have appeared.

I stared at the mug in my hand and noticed that there was a plate on my desk.  From the pattern of crumbs it had held a sandwich.  Not only that, the sandwich had been cut up into bite-sized pieces.  I didn’t recall having eaten anything.  I must have done so since there were crumbs on my jumper.   I looked at the time on my computer screen.  Six hours had elapsed since Mycroft had first walked into the branch.  So where the heck had the tea and sandwich come from?

 There was a low chuckle and I turned.  James Bond was again sitting on my sofa with one hand on my e-reader.  He looked rather pleased with himself.  The expression on my face must have been interesting because the chuckle gave way to a laugh.

“What?”

Bond smiled, “It was a good thing I was off mission.  The minions told me that when you dive into a project like that you tend to forget necessary things like eating and sleeping.  When you do so in your office they can’t even hydrate you properly.  They get worried.”

“And what else did my staff tell you?”

“Nothing much, they merely expressed the opinion that it was almost impossible to get you to eat when you were _in the zone_ so to speak.”  Bond looked thoughtful, “I’ll have to let them know that it’s a matter of size and placement.  I may not be here the next time you do this.”

I wasn’t sure how to respond to that statement so I said the first thing that popped into my head.

“If you think I’m bad you should see Sherlock.  He practically goes catatonic when he is thinking hard.”

“I’m aware,” Bond chuckled.  “You at least retain a modicum of peripheral awareness.  If I put a cup of tea or finger food within your reach you tend to eat and drink automatically.  That doesn’t even mention the fact that your normal modus-operandi is to multitask rather than fully focus on anything specific.  It’s what makes you so effective on mission coms.”

Once again I wasn’t sure how exactly to respond.  Luckily I didn’t have to.

“You find anything?  You were making frustrated noises under your breath when I left to refill your tea.”

“Nothing much,” I admitted.  “The camera in 62 died before the outside door was breached.  It is the only camera that never came back on line.  The damage looked like something caused by a power surge but a surge strong enough to do that amount of damage would have taken out everything in the entire building.  I’ll need to take a look at the damage physically to see if there is anything else.”

“And?”

“There was a light source in room 62 just after the camera fried.  It started low got brighter over several minutes and then was steady until the thieves reached the room.”

“You think something was left in the room to cause the light and the camera failure?”

“Not sure.  I’m going to see if I can match the spectrum to see if it was something special or just an incandescent bulb,” I replied.

“Given the professionalism so far I doubt you are going to find anything special,” Bond commented.  “I bet the light was nothing more than a signal.  I’ve done that before myself.  A motion sensor and a time delay.  Security goes by triggering the sensor and 2 minutes later a light turns on that I can see from outside.  I’d done my homework and knew the guard wouldn’t be back on that side of the complex for at least 45 minutes.  Easy in, easy out.”

In all probability Bond was correct.  In fact I could jury rig a rather simple system which would do just that with commonly available consumer products.  The whole thing would be as small as a stapler and plug into a wall outlet. 

“Hm,” I grunted and nodded.  “I think you are correct they were professionals who had done their homework.  They were very aware of not only the limits of the technology but also the locations of cameras and sensors in all the adjoining rooms.  I didn’t find anything in reflective surfaces or even off the high gloss furniture.  The only thing I’ve found so far was a flash of something off a silver and crystal vase.  I was just about to enhance it when I became distracted,” I waived my tea at him and took another sip.

“So let’s see it,” said Bond standing up.

I turned back to my computer and brought up the appropriate set of frames I’d isolated.  I fiddled with the images a bit with no luck.  There was nothing but 5 or so seconds of a bright green blur.

Bond said sarcastically, “Well that’s helpful.”

I nodded in agreement.

“If you didn’t have that smear of green as part of a digital image I’d put it up as a concussion artifact,” he continued.

“Excuse me?”

“Remember the Marrakesh mission when I showed up at your flat?”

I remembered alright.  Bond had been injured and I’d been retrieving the first aid kit when my hallucination had shown up.  I’d first seen the blob that initially looked somewhat like a rabbit when I’d been kidnapped by my ex-boyfriend from uni.  I’d been drugged off my arse at the time and given that the rabbit shaped blob had morphed into a very naked male fairy I’d chalked it up to a drug artifact.  I’d never told anyone but I’d seen it a number of times since; sometimes as just a flash of green, others times as the vaguely rabbit like shape but never again as the fairy.  Given the propensity of some narcotics to linger in fat cells I had figured that it was just after effects of the drugs especially since the frequency had declined precipitously over time.  In fact, after the Marrakesh mission was the last time I’d seen it and also the first time I’d questioned whether it really was a hallucination.  The reason?  Bond had joked that unless I’d spilled paint that he most likely had a concussion because he was seeing green blobs around the flat.  Now that Bond had mentioned the incident I realized that the green blur reflected off the vase was the exact same shade as my hallucination.

“Interesting,” I replied thinking furiously.

I’d done some research and investigation since that time and not come up with much.  Most of what I’d found was medical or some sort of synesthesia both of which I’d ruled out due to Bond’s observation.  The other alternative had been tied up in new-age paranormal psudo-science.  I’d kept a set of search parameters running on the internet to see if anyone else had a similar experience but nothing even remotely comparable had turned up.  Just then I remembered something else. 

“You know,” I remarked, “that’s also very similar in color to the time we had a catastrophic camera failure in lab 6.  I wonder if it’s an artifact of particular electrical components shorting out?”

Bond snorted, “Not unless my head was shorting out that time.”  He shook his head and added jokingly echoing part of the old intelligence analyst’s maximum, “Well between my concussion and your camera failure officially we should label that green blur as a coincidence!”

No Mr. Bond, I thought to myself.  If you add in my hallucinations it’s clearly _enemy action_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not dead! As is my custom I'm writing on later chapters and when I finish I go back and post an earlier one. Unfortunately Sherlock sat down on me and proceeded to veto every idea my muse put forward alternatively saying "no," "boring" and occasionally "idiot." Fortunately John eventually intervened and allowed my muse to get another chapter typed out.


	4. Rapiers, Writing Desks, and Ravens

“John.  John.  Wake up!”

I reluctantly opened my eyes to see a fully dressed Sherlock practically vibrating in my bedroom doorway.  I had known that his resolve to _wait for more data_ was not going to last but I had hoped that I could make a bit of a dent in my sleep deficit before it fell to his ravenous intellect.  At least he hadn’t tried to wake me up by shaking me this time.  I suppose ending up face down on the floor in a subdue hold when trying to rouse your flat mate out of a nightmare would tend to make someone cautious about waking said flat mate from a deep sleep.  Of course nothing was that simple with Sherlock.  No, as near as I could tell Sherlock had been observing me for quite a while now and determining exactly which method of waking me would work in which situations and to what extent.  He’d become rather adept at it and I suspected he had a spreadsheet somewhere. 

“I’m awake,” I grumbled.

“Good!” He whirled in the doorway, “We need to be out of here in less than 20 minutes to make our meeting.”

Wonderful.  I grabbed my clothes and headed for the bathroom absently wondering why I put up with such demands.  I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror as I turned on the shower.  From the look on my face, the stirring of my blood and that condition common to most males over puberty in the morning I knew exactly why I put up with vagaries of my mad flat mate.  The game was afoot and there was no way I was going to let his genius shine without proper support and appreciation. 

Less than 15 minutes later I was showered, dressed and heading into the sitting room.  Sherlock already had his coat on.  The minute he heard my steps he headed for the door, grabbing my jacket from the peg and tossing it in my direction.  I shrugged into it then was down the stairs chasing after him.  By the time I had locked the door, making sure the brass knocker was properly askew, I fully expected Sherlock to have flagged down a cab.  What I found instead was one of the girls from Speedy’s holding a to-go cup and a bag.  She handed them to me and correctly interpreting my look of surprise jerked her head in Sherlock’s direction.  I stammered my thanks and found myself entering the cab that Sherlock had summoned seemingly by magic at that very moment.  Sherlock gave an address somewhere in Kensington and we were off.  

I looked at the cup which clearly contained tea and the bag which from the smell had a warm pastry in it then at Sherlock.  That was twice in as many days.  Who, I wondered, had replaced my colleague with some strange caring doppelganger.

Sherlock looked back at me and said dryly, “Your borborygmi can be distracting and the place we are heading has neither decent tea nor pastries so I suggest you eat and drink before we get there.”

Reassured that all was right with the world I wolfed down the pastry and drank the tea finishing just as we arrived at our destination.  I paid, as usual, then followed Sherlock down the block, around a corner and into a Starbucks.

Sherlock glanced around and muttered “late” under his breath. 

Just then a table opened up so I nudged him in that direction.  He sighed and sat down.  I went around to sit in the other chair and spotted someone I had not expected.  It was Rachael, one of Mycroft’s people, who had tailed me on and off while Sherlock had been off playing dead.  She and her partner Tim had been two of my more obvious shadows on and off for almost a year.  It was kind of strange seeing her, apparently off duty, reading a paper in a coffee shop.  I guess secret service types had lives too.  I snagged a third chair for whomever Sherlock was meeting and sat down. 

We didn’t have to wait long until we were interrupted by a rather rumpled looking older fellow in a tweed jacket who walked over and said, “Let me get my order and I’ll be at your disposal,” to Sherlock. 

He obviously was a regular since he didn’t join the queue but simply went up to the pick-up area and was handed a cup that had been waiting for him.  He came back over and sat down.

“The pleasures of online ordering,” he said amicably, nodding at his cup.  “So what can I do for you today Mr. Holmes?”

What followed was 20 minutes of very specific questions asked by Sherlock about medieval swords and daggers.  He received a variety of highly technical answers, including a detailed discussion of the differences between a sword and a rapier, from the man whom I rather quickly gathered was the curator of the medieval weaponry collection at the Victoria and Albert Museum. 

Finally Sherlock seemed to run out of questions and the man sighed, “I suppose it won’t do me any good to ask.”

Sherlock merely gave him a look.

“Ah well,” he looked at me for the first time then, “it’s just been that kind of a week.  Everyone asks questions and no one tells me anything.”

Sherlock’s gaze sharpened at that remark, “What exactly was stolen?”

“An unremarkable sword and dagger set.  They weren’t that valuable with no historical providence to speak of.  A donation by the estate of Lord Mablethorp from North Wales.  Upon his death some 25 years ago the manor house was converted to regency era décor pursuant to an agreement with the National Trust and we acquired a whole bunch of medieval artifacts that just didn’t fit.”

“Tell me more,” said Sherlock.

The man glanced around, “I’ve probably said more than I should.  They made me sign something that put the entire matter under the official secrets act.”

What?  Something caught my eye behind Sherlock’s expert and I realized that I was looking at Tim, Rachael’s partner, who was just picking up his order.  I reassessed my initial conclusion of _not working_ and stepped on Sherlock’s toes under the table before he could ask anything else.  He looked at me annoyed until I stepped on his toes twice and glanced at each of my former shadows in turn. 

Well thank you much for your help,” Sherlock said standing, “I may get back to you with some specific measurements once the autopsy is complete.  Come on John.”

“Happy to help as always,” said the curator who joined me in standing.  “Nice meeting you Dr. Watson,” he added despite the fact that we hadn’t been introduced and I had no clue as to the man’s name.

We exited the coffee shop and Sherlock headed across the street and took off down the pavement at a good clip.  Half way down the block he suddenly turned, coat flaring dramatically, and darted into an alley way.  I followed only to stop short as I almost crashed into Sherlock who was standing just inside the mouth of the alley with a clear view of the coffee shop.  I scuttled in behind him and turned to look.  Rachael had just exited.  She looked around and then followed the curator.

Sherlock hummed under his breath then looked at me and said, “Mycroft’s.”

It wasn’t a question.

I must be getting better at following his train of deductions because I just replied, “They were when I last saw them just before you returned.”

“While the intelligence agencies often poach from each other, my brother steals his people from every government agency and inter-department transfers are generally singles not teams.  If they do entice a team to change branches they rarely keep them together as a unit,” Sherlock explained without prompting.  “That doesn’t even mention my brother’s propensity to refuse to let competent people go unless he absolutely is required to do so; ergo they are still Mycroft’s.”

We waited until Tim exited the Starbucks some five or so minutes later.  He too ambled off in the same direction as Rachael and the curator.  I stared after him remembering all the times the two of them had revealed their presence, most likely on orders, while Sherlock had been dead.  I thought at the time it had been a power play.  A not so subtle reminder that big brother was still watching.  I knew now that Tim and Rachael had merely been the front of a full protection detail as requested by Sherlock and implemented by Mycroft with the sole purpose of keeping the remnants of Moriarty’s empire from taking their frustration regarding the demise of their leader out on me.

Sherlock bumped me lightly with his shoulder interrupting my reverie.  I hadn’t realized until just then how close we had been standing together in the alleyway.  With a slight inclination of his head he indicated that we should continue down the street although at quite a bit slower pace than previously.  It only took him a block or so before he had decided upon his next course of action. 

“I’d like to know why my brother is so interested in Mr. Owen and what appears at first glance to be a garden variety theft at the V and A.  We won’t be able to get anything out of the museum staff and the Yard will have been removed from the case.”  He raised his hand and flagged a taxi.  “Thus we need to go and ask.  Not that he’ll tell us anything but his reactions should give me enough to deduce what is going on.”

I marveled at my flat mate as he got into the cab.  For a man who professed to have few friends and fewer still about whom he cared he was awfully protective of his _sources_ and _contacts_.  It didn’t matter if they were the homeless network, the self-named Baker Street Irregulars, or more professional sources of information the fact that Mycroft was in some manner interfering with one of them bothered him greatly. 

I expected Sherlock to give the address of the Diogenes Club but he surprised me by rattling off an address that was near Whitehall.  Interesting, we apparently were going to go beard the lion in his official den.

It wasn’t as hard as I expected.  No subterfuge was required.  Sherlock strode confidently into a gaggle of nondescript buildings containing generic government offices going directly to a particular one that looked no different than any of its brethren.  Once there he ignored the receptionist and headed straight through an unmarked door into an open floor plan office filled with desks and office workers.  The receptionist had trailed us, squawking something about security only to shut up suddenly when a white haired gentleman got up from his desk and stepped in front of Sherlock.

Sherlock looked the man up and down then stated, “He’s due in less than 10 minutes.  We’ll wait.”

“Very well Mr. Holmes,” the man replied while stepping aside and gesturing in the direction of another unmarked door.  “Thank you very much Bethany,” the man added as he turned to trail behind Sherlock and I as we headed in the indicated direction.  Through the door and down a short hallway we went ignoring side offices heading toward what clearly was the unmarked Sanctum Sanctorum of this bit of bureaucracy.

I don’t quite know what I expected from Mycroft’s official office; probably wood paneling, leather wing back chairs and a huge mahogany desk.  That wasn’t what I got.  Instead there was relatively generic, modern style office furniture.  There were only a very few clues that this was not just your average office.  The desk was slightly larger than normal and all of the pieces looked a bit higher quality than one would expect in a simple government office but what really gave the show away was the high tech desk chair which Sherlock proceed to commandeer. 

There was also a bookcase full of nice looking volumes.  Intrigued I went over to look.  Mostly history, some biography, a couple reference works, and a few fiction offerings.  I spotted a set of Raymond Chandler stories and even a John Le Carré novel in the mix.

Sherlock, who had just finished fussing with his mobile, noticed my interest and commented, “The shelf at eye level is the important one.  The books are changed depending upon the person he is meeting and the impression he wants to project.  The shelf is currently set in the _generic bureaucrat_ version.”

I went back to my perusing of titles.  Sherlock was right as usual.  Judging by the middle bookshelf this was the office of some mid-level bureaucrat.  I was just about to make a comment about it when the door open and Mycroft walked in.

“To what do I owe the pleasure brother dear?”

Sherlock didn’t bother with pleasantries.  “I’m curious as to why your office is heading up the investigation into the theft of some rather unremarkable weaponry from the V and A.  It’s a bit out of your normal remit.”

Mycroft shut the door and then strolled over to the window without saying anything.  Sherlock sat bolt upright in the chair. 

“The appropriate response,” Mycroft said without turning around, “would be to tell you it’s classified.”

I really must be better at reading the nuances of Holmsian behavior.  I could tell that Mycroft was uncomfortable or uneasy with something.  It was highly reminiscent of when Sherlock thought there was a connection between two or more crimes but he didn’t have anything concrete enough to deduce the relationship.  He had likened it once to attempting to deduce the picture in the middle of a jigsaw puzzle from a handful of disparate edge pieces.  You could only get a general idea of the type of picture not anything specific enough to make anything other than a moderately educated guess.

“However,” Mycroft continued, “given Lestrade’s case and your consultation with Mr. Owen I suspect that any attempt I might make would require far more effort and resources than I am willing to commit at this time.”

“And most likely be futile as well,” Sherlock replied.

Mycroft turned and glared at him.  The unsaid statement was that if Mycroft really wanted to keep something classified there would be a sudden cold snap in hell before Sherlock would ever find out. 

Sherlock’s shrug was just as non-vocally eloquent; _we will have to test that sometime_.

I figured I’d better say something before the two of them went completely nonverbal on me but luckily I wasn’t required to do so.

“Be that as it may,” Mycroft continued, “Since Lestrade’s alleged terrorists were potentially murdered with a medieval weapon and that my office’s investigations involve missing medieval weaponry the two cases will I suspect at some point overlap.”  He sighed, “Much as it pains me dear brother I suppose I will need to include you and Dr. Watson as consultants on this.”

He moved toward his desk only to stop short as if for the first time noticing that Sherlock was sitting in his chair.  I was even more surprised when Sherlock vacated it without anything being said.  This looked like it might take a while so I sat down in one of the visitor chairs.  Sherlock simply took the other as Mycroft reclaimed his desk.

“I have recently been made aware of some ultra-top-secret protocols regarding my office which date from the reign of Queen Victoria.  They involve the location of certain items of what normally might be considered memorabilia.  The items are not historically significant, not terribly valuable but if they go missing this office is informed and is directed to take _appropriate precautions for the preservation of the realm_.”

“So what exactly does that mean?” I asked.

“The protocols do not specify any particular actions, however, each time one or more of the items have been reported as missing events which are historically significant in our national history seem to occur shortly thereafter.  The last time these particular items disappeared was just before the initial German attacks on London during World War II.”

“Causation or mere concurrence?” Sherlock mused aloud.

“That indeed is the question.  I have raised the threat level in an abundance of caution.”

Sherlock refrained from making a derisive comment to that statement and I looked between the two brothers in surprise.  I had noticed a shift in their relations starting when Sherlock came back from his hiatus.  Things had thawed considerably after their youngest sibling, Quentin, had been kidnapped and rescued.  Their banter had gone from having the vicious sarcastic overtones I had noted when I first had met Mycroft to something more akin to sibling teasing.  Now Mycroft was being down right loquacious and forthright in sharing information and Sherlock was abstaining from commenting on the rarity of the occasion.  All of this indicated that Sherlock had picked up on something in his brother’s behavior or mannerisms which meant that whatever was going on had a high potential to be not only serious but highly important.

“Protocols generally define a series of actions,” Sherlock stated cocking his head at Mycroft.

“The other action specified is: _Notify the Historian_.  My people have yet to find anyone with such a title in the Government or references to such a title elsewhere.” 

“Have you asked…,” Sherlock didn’t get to finish before Mycroft interrupted.

“He is working on the malfunctions of the security system at present in an attempt to get more information about the theft.”

Sherlock bristled at that, “And you didn’t think to call me?”

“Even you brother dear would have a hard time finding physical evidence in areas that had been traipsed through by the great unwashed masses for a little over two days and been thoroughly wiped down at least once.”

Once again Sherlock picked up on something I had missed.

“Legwork? You?”

“Occasionally it is necessary,” Mycroft’s face twitched in what I assumed would have been a disgusted grimace in anyone else. 

At this point there was a tap at the door and Mycroft’s drop dead gorgeous P.A., whom I inevitably thought of as Not-Anthea, entered without waiting for an acknowledgement.  Mycroft’s eyebrows flew up and Sherlock’s gaze sharpened.

“You requested immediate notification Sir,” she said.

Mycroft sighed then indicated Sherlock and myself, “I have engaged my brother and his blogger to consult on the present matter.”

His assistant still seemed reluctant to say anything more but Sherlock filled the silence for her, “So what other ancient protocol has been activated now?” he asked.

She glanced at Mycroft and apparently getting some sort of confirmation stated, “Bran has been reported as AWOL Sir.”

It doesn’t happen very often with Sherlock and I’d never seen it before with Mycroft but both Holmes brothers wore identical blank expressions.  It wasn’t even the patented Holmesian _I don’t understand the popular culture reference_ stare.  This was clearly the genius equivalent of _What the f*** are you talking about_?

“One of the Tower Raven’s sir,” Not-Anthea helpfully supplied. 

Mycroft blinked slowly.  Sherlock turned to look at him.

“This office is required to be notified when something like this happens,” she explained.  “According to the file the last time was just before you took over this office.  Muinin took an unscheduled five day holiday to Greenwich.  The previous incident was in 1981 when Grog deserted.”

“Deserted?” I asked.

“All the Tower Ravens are enlisted as members of Her Majesty’s forces and as such are subject to many of the same rules and regulations.  In fact they can, and have in the past, been dismissed for _conduct unbecoming._ ”

I hadn’t known that.  I did, however, know at least one thing about the Tower Ravens.

“Their wings are clipped so how did he get out?” I asked.

I was surprised that neither of the Holmes brothers had jumped in yet.  I suspected that Sherlock was as usual just letting me ask the obvious questions before spouting a stream of deductions.  I didn’t know about Mycroft.

“They only clip the flight feathers on one side,” Not-Anthea explained. “They can glide and fly for short distances.  Bran, by all reports, was spotted on the wall late yesterday.  He didn’t appear for his evening feeding, which occasionally occurs, but he then didn’t appear for this morning’s feeding.  The Raven Master notified the appropriate authorities, including us.  I took the liberty of setting a team on the CCTV feeds.  So far we have discovered that Bran has made use of a variety of the area’s public transit resources but he, like you,” She inclined her head in Sherlock’s direction, “seems to prefer cabs.”

Sherlock snorted and levered himself out of his chair, “We’ll show ourselves out,” he smirked at Mycroft, “and leave you to tracking errant Ravens and locating the current holder of a job title that doesn’t exist.”

Mycroft didn’t deign to reply to that but the look on his face was priceless.


	5. Welcome to the Dark Ages

I woke up suddenly and for a moment was completely disoriented.  Surprisingly it was a scent, no, more like a series of scents, that grounded my spinning brain.  The body-wash from the MI-6 gym combined with Bond’s aftershave and Shirley’s fabric softener told me I was on the couch in my office covered with the throw that lived on its back except for the occasional times R took it home to launder. 

So how did I end up in this particular position?

The last thing I remembered was being rather annoyed.  I had spent over 10 hours messing with the V&A data six ways from center only to get a smear of green partially reflected in a variety of surfaces.  That was on top of coming off a series of back to back 00 missions which required my presence to hack a specific server in coordination with 006’s particular brand of destruction and to turn off a security system for 004.  Neither of those tasks had been delegable and due to the locations of the agents a set time for the task could not be predetermined.  All of which meant I’d just spent the last 48 hours cooped up in MI 6 with minimal rest.

I remembered drafting a note to Mycroft regarding my progress.  It really was more an explanation of lack of progress than anything else.  I’d tweaked one of my search programs to see if I could find something matching that particular shade of green limiting it to Great Britain and avoiding sites that I knew would generate extraneous hits such as DeivantArt.  I’d also requested the damaged camera from room 62 along with one of the intermittently failed cameras be provided only to be told that they wouldn’t arrive until tomorrow mid-morning at the earliest.  How long does it take to put something in a box and have someone walk it to Vauxhall Cross? 

I had taken my glasses off and put my head down on my desk for just a moment intending to take a cat nap.  It was at that point things became rather fuzzy.  I vaguely remembered a familiar voice say _Ah so we are doing this again_ in a rather amused tone.  Then there was a floating sensation followed shortly thereafter by warmth and the same voice saying softly to someone else _No I don’t think he’s going to let go.  No problem.  I’ll extricate myself in a bit._  

Clearly someone had found me sleeping and managed to move me without completely waking me up.  The number of people who could accomplish that particular feat were few and far between.  Their number had shrunk even more after my kidnapping.  Of that elite group there were only two currently in the building and Moneypenny wouldn’t have picked me up, instead she would have sleepwalked me to the sofa.  That left only one real alternative, Bond.

As if the thought had conjured him, my office door opened and the man himself slipped inside.  He was carrying a mug, coffee by the smell, which he placed on the desk presumably in preparation for settling into my chair.  He glanced in my direction and stopped moving.  I’m not quite sure how but he somehow had determined I was awake.

“Good morning, Q,” he said as he snagged his mug off the desk without siting down.

I sat up and felt around for my glasses.  They were where I normally left them when napping on the couch.  I slipped them on and the blur that was Bond resolved into focus.

“What,” I asked, “are you still doing here?”

Bond was technically on post mission leave.  The fact that he’d slept in my office then stayed while I worked on the initial stages of Mycroft’s request was unusual but not out of character.  What was I bit strange was that he was still around at, I glanced at the clock, zero two hundred.  Normal after mission behavior would have been for him to sleep a bit then leave in search of something alcoholic.

“Close protection detail,” Bond interrupted my thoughts by answering.

“What?”

“Orders came down mid-day yesterday a bit after you had started chasing that greenish reflection.”

“Any idea why?” 

Given the current intelligence stream I couldn’t think of any reason why the government threat levels would be ramped up like that.  An increase in certain types chatter might do it but then someone would have disturbed me in an attempt to get more specific intel.

Once again Bond’s response interrupted my musing, “Over abundance of caution I was told.  Apparently some World War era protocols which have not been rescinded have been triggered.  The Home Office raised the overall general threat level and put most of the intelligence community on high alert until they can figure out why those protocols exist and if they are still valid.”

Well that explained the close protection detail.  What remained in question was why would Mycroft, and I knew it had to have been Mycroft, order the high alert on such a flimsy rational?

“Your branch and Intentions have shifted to full coverage shifts,” Bond continued.  “The subsidiary orders are causing a bit of frustration since there has been no identification of a threat or even a potential threat.  The only instructions have been to watch out for things that are _a bit bizarre_.”

I blinked at him, “So we are looking for signs of the apocalypse I presume?”

“They are especially interested strange chatter from the usual places that doesn’t appear to relate to anything else.”

“Lovely,” I rolled my eyes.  “The last time we had instructions like that Intentions ended up half analyzing the plot line to a prototype video game.  We were very lucky that one of the engineers was an alpha tester.” 

I swung my feet to the floor to head for my computer.

“I suppose I’ll need to get a list started of everything we know is in alpha release or better to avoid that problem,” I said.

Bond stepped in front of me blocking my access.

“R already did that,” he informed me.  “You need food and more sleep, not necessarily in that order.  You are not scheduled in the rotation until 1600 so we just need to determine where exactly you are going to get those things.”

I craned my neck to look up at him thinking that I could crash in the suite of safe rooms that we had in the building.

“Nope,” Bond seemingly read my mind, “Only one executive sleeping in the building at a time.  M is using the safe rooms with Moneypenny on protection detail.”

“Tanner?”

“003 made it back was done with debrief around 23:30.  He took Tanner to one of the safe houses.  The other department heads were assigned A-list agents and they are all bunking with them,” Bond informed me.

“Leaving me with you.”

Bond smiled, “At M’s direct order no less.”

“Lovely,” I said again.

“As if I wasn’t your favorite,” Bond grinned unrepentantly.

I looked around, spotted my shoes and started putting them on.

“So where are you going to stash me?”

“You have a choice, safe house or my flat.  I will however tell you that the food and the thread count on the sheets will be better at the latter than the former,” Bond rumbled amusedly as he stepped back.

I stood.

“Your flat then,” I decided knowing full well the quality, or more precisely the lack thereof, of safe house accommodations.

Bond nodded most likely having anticipated my decision, “I had R raid your locker for additional clothing so all you need is to grab your coat and _go-bag_.”

I blinked at Bond again.  I hadn’t known that anyone knew about that.

Early on in my career at MI 6 I had determined that the standard agent’s practice of having a bag with the essentials all packed and stashed somewhere such that you could just grab and go was a good idea.  As I’d worked my way up the hierarchy I’d placed such _go-bags_ not only in my flat but also in a couple of places around the building.  When I became Q that number had increased substantially.  Of course what I considered essential was a little different from most of the agents however they all did include a burn mobile, ID, funds and an _untracable_ firearm. 

Once again Bond seemed to read my mind and answer a question I hadn’t asked aloud.

“I found the one that’s stashed near your emergency exit several months ago and thought it was a good idea,” Bond cocked his head at me, “and then I saw the one in here, the one in the armoire in Moneypenny’s office, as well as the one in your lab.” 

I shrugged and tried to look apologetic.  At least he hadn’t found out about the…

“Which doesn’t even mention the gym, the carpark, the firing range and the server room,” Bond continued.

Damn.

“Given your recent level of paranoia, which I think is somewhat justified I might add, I suspect I missed a few.”

For some reason it made me feel a bit better that Bond wasn’t judging me for being prepared.  Then it sunk in that he was asking me to take a bag along to his flat even though he’d just told me that the alert was merely an _overabundance of caution_.  I raised an eyebrow at him.

“You’ll sleep better,” he said in a matter of fact tone.

There was indeed something to be said for having someone who knew you well on close protection detail.  It saved a lot of time in explanation.  I looked around my office grabbed my phone, my tablet, and appropriate chargers and cords adding them to the _go-bag_.  Less than a minute later I was shrugging on my coat and we were heading out.

I was a little surprised when we reached the car park that we didn’t take Bond’s Aston-Martin.  Instead we grabbed one of the non-descript pool cars.  We also didn’t end up driving directly to Bond’s flat.  Instead Bond took us on a 45 minute drive that was clearly meant to flush out any tailing vehicles.  Apparently satisfied that we were not being pursued Bond finally headed in the general direction of his abode.  Once again I was surprised when we didn’t end up in the car park of Bond’s building but one on an adjacent street.  From there we wound our way through several allegedly locked access doors, across an alley, around some bins and finally into another car park which I recognized as belonging to Bond’s building only because I spotted Trevelyan’s motor bike parked in a corner. 

When we hit the flat Bond checked all the rooms one by one including the loo.  Despite his earlier assurances I could see that he was taking this alert very seriously.  Finally Bond relaxed and took off his coat and suit jacket leaving him in shirt sleeves and shoulder holster. 

“Sleep or food first Quartermaster?” he asked.

I took a quick self-assessment.  I’d managed to eat, thanks to Bond providing bite-sized snacks while I had been working, so sleep was the more urgent priority.

“Bed,” Bond pointed, “I’ll be on the couch.”

Apparently I hadn’t responded fast enough.  I started to protest but he just glared and I knew that this was an argument which I wouldn’t win.  There was nothing for it but to go to the bedroom, strip down and climb into what was one of the more obscenely comfortable beds in which I’d ever had the occasion to sleep. 

When I awoke next it was near noon judging by the light.  That meant I could afford to lay about at least until either my bladder or my stomach prompted me to move.  I snuggled into the bedding preparing to see if I could doze off again.  Alas, that was not to be.

No sooner than I had become comfortable Bond burst into the room, gun drawn, saying “Get dressed, get your gear, we’ve been compromised!”

I sat up and looked at him.  He was as ruffled as I’d ever seen him off mission; rumpled clothes, messy hair and a rather spooked expression.  It was the latter that concerned me the most.  This was James Bond, the epitome of unflappability even in the most extreme circumstances.  Whatever had disconcerted him to this extent must be serious.  Without thinking I slipped into mission mode.

“Site Rep” I snapped as I bailed out of the bed and started tugging on my clothes. 

“Someone managed to access the flat without waking me up.”

Now that was surprising.  Bond in no way was a heavy sleeper and even off mission he was somehow aware of most everything in his vicinity.  On mission, I knew he considered this protection detail to be on mission, he was hyper alert.  Even cat-napping the merest hint of something out of the ordinary and he’d be wide awake pointing a gun at whatever it was.  I’d seen him do it on multiple occasions.

“Security system?”

“Not engaged.  I’m better,” he paused, “at least I thought I was better.”

I was almost dressed.

“How fast do we need to move?”

“I didn’t find anything in the flat and there are no hostiles that I can see from the windows.  I don’t think we need to move immediately but the faster the better.”

I rummaged around in my bag.

“I need to check for bugs and trackers before we leave,” I said as I located the piece of gear I needed.  “What tipped you off that someone had breached the flat?”

“There’s a bloody sword sitting on the coffee table,” Bond replied flatly.

That brought me up short.

“A what?”

“A sword.  You know Q, long metallic pointy thing you can swing about.  It was most definitely not there when we arrived but it is there now.”

You could cut Bond’s sarcastic tone with a knife or in this case a sword.

“Oh,” was all I could think to say.

It took me less than 5 minutes to determine that there were no electronic bugs in the flat and another 5 to pronounce us and our gear free from any tracking devices that I had not placed personally.  I then pulled out my tablet and accessed the building security.  There had been a short power outage for the entire area at about half five lasting for seven and a quarter minutes.  Simultaneously to the power outage a side door sensor had gone offline for almost the exact same period of time.  Of course there was nothing on the camera feeds, not that I had expected anything.  Whomever we were dealing with was way too good for that.

With the immediate tasks done I turned my attention to the cause of all the commotion.  The sword itself didn’t register anything electronic.  I supposed that someone could have secreted something in the hilt or the pommel but as I looked closer the wear patterns did not indicate any recent tampering.  All in all it looked like a bog-standard medieval sword.  Judging by the bright edge, however, it had been recently sharpened. 

Looking at the weapon my brain suddenly switched gears on me.  While working on Mycroft’s task I’d been more interested in how the thieves circumvented the security than anything else.  Now suddenly I needed to know just what exactly had been stolen from Room 62 of the Victoria & Albert.  A couple of keystrokes remedied my lack of knowledge.

“Shit!” was the first thing out of my mouth as I saw the image.  The next thing was, “We’ve got to take it with us.”

The statement echoed slightly in the room and I realized that Bond had said the exact same thing a beat or so behind my outburst.

Bond looked surprised for a moment then smirked, “You tell me yours and I’ll tell you mine.”

Only Bond could make such a simple request end up completely laden with innuendo.

“That,” I pointed at the sword, “was important enough for someone to break into the V&A to obtain and important enough to plant in your flat.  They didn’t even wait until the flat was empty to place it here.  Until we know more we need to keep it secret.”

After a short pause Bond nodded in agreement then said, “My reason isn’t quite so logical.  In fact it’s rather nonsensical when you come right down to it.”  He looked at me attempting to gage something and continued, “That sword is a dead ringer for the one the shows up in my recurring dreams.”

The entire situation was becoming very strange very quickly.  I couldn’t see a pattern yet but I had a hunch that Bond and I were only seeing the tip of the iceberg.  What was clear was that someone was trying to play Bond, myself, or both of us.  At this point it looked like whomever was behind this was, at least in part using, the intelligence establishment from Mycroft on down to do so.  Luckily dealing with my half-brothers had taught me quite a few things over the years not the least of which was a sure fire method for disrupting a game in progress.  Suddenly removing a piece or pieces from play had the tendency to require major strategic shifts to compensate.  Watching those shifts often told you more about what you were dealing with than any intelligence analysis ever could.  This was exactly the type of thing Bond did on mission. 

“We need to go dark,” I stated bluntly.  “The only thing we need to decide is whose resources to use.”

Bond grinned back at me, “Not quite Quartermaster.  We also need to decide who officially calls it.  Are you going dark and taking me as a bodyguard or am I exercising my prerogative as your protection detail?”

I had to think for a moment.

“The latter I think.  Which means your resources to start with.”

“Once I call it in we’ll need to move fast.  We’ll use Alec’s bike.”  Bond replied.

“Give me 10 minutes,” I said then added, “and that high tech blanket you didn’t return after the Siberia mission two months ago.”

Bond looked startled that I knew he still had it and that it was intact.  I just smiled enigmatically.  A bloke has to keep some secrets. 

It only took a few minutes to set in motion a couple of cyber contingencies.  It took a bit longer to wrap the sword and jury rig a harness for bond that didn’t look like he was running around with medieval weaponry strapped to his back.  Some of the same properties that made the blanket both light weight and warm also masked heat signatures and electronic radiation.  If the sword was broadcasting its location or anything else the signal wouldn’t get past the blanket.

We were on the road in less than my 10 minute estimate.  Once we were clear of the vicinity of the flat Bond stopped the bike in a loading zone and called it in. 

“Hey Shirley,” Bond smoozed on the phone, “what did you think of the results of my last sales trip?”  He listened for a minute or so then replied, “Oh no, that’s not enough.  The world is not enough for that.”  He listened again then laughed and rang off without saying goodbye. 

Bond looked over his shoulder at me sitting on the back of the bike.  He handed me the mobile then turned and started the engine.  I in the meantime removed the SIM chip and snapped it.  We started moving and I dropped the chip then lobbed the phone in the direction of a nearby wheelie bin.  Surprisingly it went in easily.  I chose to take it as a hopeful sign that our exodus from the grid would be just as smooth.


	6. On the Hunt

It took less than three steps down the pavement after we exited the building containing Mycroft’s office for Sherlock to slip into _Major Case_ mode.  I’m not quite sure what exactly tipped me off, the set of his shoulders, his stride length, the miniscule lines of tension around his eyes but it was clear at least to me that Sherlock’s considerable intellect was now fully focused.

He raised his hand and a cab smoothly pulled to a stop in front of us.  We piled in and the cabbie asked cheerfully, “Where to?”

“Barts,” Sherlock said and pulled out his phone.

“Right O,” the cabbie replied then asked, “Round front or loading dock?”

“Side door,” Sherlock replied without looking up.

I took a good look at the cabbie.  The majority of the cab drivers in London are immigrants but this one looked and sounded like second generation at the minimum. 

Just then the cabbie caught my eye in the rear view mirror and grinned at me.

Suddenly it all made sense.  The reason that Sherlock could always seem to conjure a cab was obvious.  Sherlock Holmes was part of _The Knowledge_ that unwritten lore required of cabbies in London.  They, like the homeless network, were part of _The Work_ and they knew it.  At some point, probably after one of their own had tried to kill Sherlock, they had collectively decided to assist.  I idly wondered how exactly it worked as I inclined my head in acknowledgement.

Sherlock finished up whatever he’d been doing on his mobile just as we pulled up.  We hopped out and I paid with notes that I knew hadn’t been in my wallet when I’d left the flat. 

As I turned to follow Sherlock into the hospital I thought I heard the cabbie say softly, “Happy hunting Dr. Watson.” 

When we got to the morgue I was surprised to find Molly finishing up on the first of the three bodies from the day before.

“Sorry I didn’t have time to get the others out for you,” she said to Sherlock.  “I was a little busy when you texted.  My initial measurements are on that pad.”  She pointed with her chin.

Sherlock didn’t head in that direction immediately.  Instead he stopped on the other side of the table and examined the corpse’s forearm minutely.  I remembered Sherlock’s remark about the tattoo removal.

“Try using black light on this,” was his comment as he straightened.

“Picture is in the camera,” Molly replied.  “Haven’t downloaded it yet but it didn’t look like much.  They did a really good job on it. 

“Hmph,” was Sherlock’s reply as he went to look at her notations.

I wondered what we were doing here.  More often than not Sherlock waited until after the autopsy was complete and then nicked the notes.  Sometimes, especially on cases where the body had already been removed by the time we got to the crime scene, he’d come take a look before any of the proceedings had started.  I could count on one hand the times he’d come in mid-autopsy.  I noticed that Sherlock surreptitiously snapped a couple of photos with his phone of Molly’s measurements just as she finished the last suture on the Y incision.   

“You want to wait for me to transcribe those?”  She asked.

“Nope.”  Sherlock popped the terminal p.  “Where are the other two?”

“23 and 24.  What are you looking at?”

I suspected the answer.

“Wound placement and measurements.”

“Right,” Molly was matter of fact.  “Let me put him away and we’ll get started then.”

We rather quickly fell into a rhythm and did the job with minimal fuss, muss and bother.  Molly didn’t object to the help.  It was a lot faster than if she’d been doing it all herself.  Without an assistant it would have taken her most of the day.  With the three of us working together it only took a few hours.

Once we had finished Sherlock put the pad upon which he had been scribbling measurements as Molly and I called them out and started texting furiously. 

“Thanks,” Molly remarked as we moved the third body back into its assigned drawer, “this will speed things up a bit.  You’ll have to wait for the tox screens to come back but at this point I don’t expect anything much from _tall, dark and ripped_ ,” she pointed an elbow at the drawer containing body number two, “or _svelte and French_ ,” she nodded at body number three as she closed the door.  “God only knows what our _local boy_ was into,” she added in reference to the gentleman she’d been working on when we arrived.  “Given the state of his liver though a fair bit of it was alcohol.”

Every job has its own terminology and customs so I wasn’t surprised by Molly’s penchant for nicknaming the as yet unidentified corpses.  I knew that she scrupulously referred to the bodies in her care rather formally if their names were known.  It was partially as a sign of respect and partially to keep a mental distance.  For some reason that just wasn’t possible for her to do that with the unknowns.  Apparently _Ms. Smith_ , _Mr. Bloggs_ or _Number 1234_ really didn’t work for her so she chose a positive attribute and then referred to the unknown by that pseudonym until they were positively identified.  Two of the nicknames were obvious.  Corpse number three clearly had acquired the sobriquet _French_ due to his tattoo reading _Tu me Manques_ and corpse number two was physically as described.

“ _Local Boy_?” I inquired as I stripped and binned my gloves.

“Stomach contents,” Sherlock commented vaguely from across the room.

Molly smiled, “Only a local would go half way across town from where he was found to get take away from Francy’s.”

That explained it.  The shop in question was almost impossible to find unless you knew exactly where you were headed.  But that left a question.  Sherlock had deduced a Midland’s gang association.  Was he wrong or had our _Local Boy_ relocated when he got his promotion and spent some funds on tattoo removal? 

The high resolution color printer started up and I realized that Sherlock had been playing around with Molly’s camera and computer presumably downloading the autopsy pictures.  I wandered over and snagged the printouts.  It was, as I had suspected, the pictures of _Local Boy’s_ removed tattoo.  I ferried them over to Sherlock at the desk.  He took a look then grimaced.

“It really was a very good job of removal,” I commented in reply.

Sherlock’s face went completely blank at that.  A moment later he blinked then looked up at me with a smile. 

“Exactly John!”

He stood up and headed for the coat rack. 

“If we are lucky he had it done here in London, not Manchester, Liverpool or somewhere else.” 

I realized then what he was on about.  The equipment and expertise to do that good a job was not cheap.  The one thing I didn’t know was how widely available it was in greater London.  We could figure out the tattoo if we could find the person who had removed it.  Of course there would be a bit of a problem once we found who had done the removal.  Tattoo removal at that level was a medical procedure after all which meant patient confidentiality rules.  I did suppose that given the fact that the patient was dead we could have Lestrade use the need for “full and conclusive identification” to get around that. 

Thinking of Lestrade shook my brain out of its frenetic musing.  If _Local Boy_ had indeed gang associations then his prints would be in the system.  From there a name and known associates would be easily obtained.  That left me right back where I had started; wondering why Sherlock was so excited about tracing the tattoo removal when it would be less than a day or so before we had positive identification. 

I blinked and realized that Sherlock had paused at the door.  As soon as our eyes met he whirled away into the hall leaving me sputtering a quick goodbye to Molly and scrambling out the door after him. 

I caught him at the lift and asked, “So where to now?”

He cocked his head at me and replied, “Back to Baker Street for the moment.  I need you to do a bit of research on medical tattoo removal.  Focus on techniques and equipment as opposed to practitioners and locations.”

I had expected at least part of the request.  I was a bit confused why he didn’t want me to track down places where the procedure was performed.

“I have a method to narrow down the potential places where our deceased gentleman had it done,” Sherlock informed me as we exited the lift.  “Unfortunately…,” he trailed off a pensive look on his face.

Oh I knew that look.  It was the one where Sherlock expected me to strenuously object to the action he was about to propose.  I sighed.  He clearly was going to use some of his less reputable informants who would be less than forthcoming if I were present.  Many of those informants had been developed during the time he was using and I worried.  It must have shown on my face because I didn’t even need to voice my concern.

“I’ll text before and after each interview,” Sherlock assured me.  “If you don’t receive anything for two hours then call Mycroft and have him trace my phone.”

I raised my eyebrows at that.  Sherlock telling me to call Mycroft for something.  He grimaced at me as we got into the cab.  I interpreted the look as _necessary evil_.  The mere mention of Mycroft seemed to have soured Sherlock’s mood and he sulked most of the way home.  Just before we got there however he brightened up.

“At least we are officially consultants this time John,” he remarked. 

I thought I knew where he was going but I kept my mouth shut.

“Keep track of your research time.  I fully intend to present The British Government with an itemized bill for our services.”  He exited the cab and paid the driver before adding, “even though we’ll most likely want to take our remuneration in kind as opposed to cash.”

“Speak for yourself,” I teased as I followed him up the stairs and into our flat.  “I at least could use an extra quid or two.”

Sherlock headed for his room and I headed for my laptop to get right on the necessary research.  Despite the joking around at Mycroft’s expense I could tell that Sherlock was taking this case very seriously.  Maybe it was the fact that Mycroft had willingly enlisted the help of both his brothers in their respective specialties and even let Sherlock see his uncertainty that was leading Sherlock to pull out all the stops and expedite his investigation.  Whatever it was it behooved me to do my part so I booted up the laptop and started in.

I was just starting to dig into the subject when Sherlock came back out of his room.  He was dressed in tatty jeans, trainers and a windcheater.  He disappeared into the kitchen for a minute or so and came back out looking a bit dirty and with somewhat greasy hair. 

“Coffee grounds and olive oil,” he said in response to my look. 

He headed for the door paused and pulled out an older mobile from a pocket before taking off down the stairs.  As I had suspected my mobile buzzed with a text from an unknown number moments later.  It was a time stamped photo of the bin in the back alley. 

*****

Several hours and a number of time stamped photos via SMS later I knew more than I ever wanted to know about laser tattoo removal.  Apparently the quality of the removal was in part due to the composition of the original tattoo, in part due to the equipment and in part due to the operator of same.  Monochrome responded better than multi-colored and smaller, simpler tattoos were the easiest to remove.  I had a list of higher end equipment as well as a list of private practitioners who advertised that they used said equipment. 

That task done I took a look at the photos Sherlock had sent.  I recognized a variety of landmarks, some famous but others only familiar to the two of us.  From what I knew of the locations and the time stamps Sherlock had covered a lot of ground. 

I felt a little useless at the moment not quite knowing what I could do to aid in the case then it came to me.  I had some of my own resources that I could tap for information.  Not about tattoos, I figured that Sherlock had that angle well covered, but more on the sword fighting angle.  One of my mates from Afghanistan, now discharged, was an MMA fighter.  I’d gone with him once to the dojo where he trained.  The place had been not quite to my taste as a place to work out but I had noticed that they had an extensive set of weapons on the wall.  My buddy Mark had noticed my interest and mentioned in passing that this particular establishment had a Sensi who was relatively famous for his weapons work.  I figured it was a place to start.  A couple of texts later I’d wrangled an introduction to Sensi Brian Kurtis and a meeting in an hour or so at a Dojo. 

Sensi Brian, as he insisted I call him, proved to be whipcord thin man who looked to be in his 60’s but was probably older.  He was part owner of the Dojo and despite his given title I thought he’d physically fit in more in the Scottish highlands than in an establishment with a distinctly Japanese flavor.  Sherlock most likely would have been able to tell more about his heritage and the like from the state of his shoes or something. 

Now Sherlock doesn’t have a very high opinion regarding my ability to deceive someone.  He seems to think that everyone can tell when I am being untruthful.  I have always found that people tend to believe me when I tell the truth.  Therefore when I need to be deceitful I tell the truth, just not the whole truth.

I explained that Sherlock and I were working on a case involving missing medieval weaponry; Mycroft had hired us as consultants after all.  I indicated that we were interested in having contacts who could keep an eye out for the missing pieces.  Sensi Brian provided the names of a couple of other establishments who taught medieval sword and dagger style fencing and promised a contact with the local historical reenactment crowd.  I thanked him and mentioned in passing my experiences in Afghanistan dealing with the damage bladed weapons could inflict by accident.  That comment in turn lead to a discussion of differences in fighting styles based on the weaponry being used, a practical demonstration and links to a couple of You-Tube videos.  By the time I returned to Baker Street I was feeling that I had accomplished quite a bit in furtherance of the investigation.


	7. Apocalypse Quartered

 

My brother Sherlock has an almost encyclopedic knowledge of the available surveillance cameras in the greater London Metropolitan area.  I had never bothered storing such information since I was inevitably on the _Seek_ side of any _Hide and Seek_ games that he or anyone else would play.  By the time we reached our destination however, it became clear to me that Bond had something similar.  The more I reflected on our path to date I realized that Bond was not only strategically using blind spots but also busy intersections, crowds and traffic patterns to give any recognition algorithm absolute fits.  That explained a lot about his uncanny ability to drop off my surveillance when on mission.   

We had started off making a blatant show of getting out of town on the M4 then ducked off onto side roads and circled around to come into London again from the north-west.  Alec’s bike was ubiquitous in many respects so we didn’t ditch it.  We swapped out helmets a couple times by the simple expedient of switching them with those on parked bikes.  At one point we exchanged jackets and I even drove with Bond riding pillion for a time to switch up our profile.  Of course all the subterfuge was potentially rendered ineffective due to the fact that we were carrying a rather distinctively shaped large package containing one wrapped sword the entire time.  We did change the outside wrapping a couple times as well as acquired and discarded additional _shopping_ bags so maybe the sword was not quite as conspicuous as it felt.

Eventually we ended up a nondescript storage garage.  Bond got off the bike and punched a code into a keypad.  I suppose I was expecting an Audi, an Aston-Martin or some other high performance vehicle.  What was sitting in the unit however was a several year old grey Volkswagen Golf. 

My face must have shown my surprise because Bond smiled at me saying, “Camouflage.”

I thought for a moment; it made sense.  The only thing better for blending in would have been a white Ford Fiesta.  I maneuvered the bike into the garage and Bond closed the door behind us. 

“We’ll be here for a little bit,” Bond informed me as he headed for a large tool chest.

I parked the bike, unloaded then covered it with a slightly dirty tarp that I found sitting in a corner.  The dust I raised in the process would, I hoped, make it look at least superficially like the bike hadn’t been moved for a while.  I transferred our stuff to the backseat of the car then took the time to look around.  The car took up most of the room but along one wall was the aforementioned tool chest, a small work bench and some storage cabinets.  I idly wondered what they contained.  While I was busy Bond had opened the tool chest and was rummaging around in it.  He looked over at me then, as if sensing my thoughts, he started talking.

“We are a paranoid lot,” he remarked.  “Most of the 00’s have multiple cashes off the books.  We also tend know the locations and access codes to a few of the other’s spots.  This one at least nominally belongs to Laura but Alec and I have used it often enough so that it’s turned into a shared area.”  He pulled out a mobile and it’s charger then jerked his chin at one of the cabinets, “Clothes are in there.  Switch out your jacket and grab a hat and scarf that will fit me.  I need to set up our accommodations.”

I opened the indicated cabinet and started looking for something suitable.  Behind me I could hear Bond making a call.  From what I could hear of the conversation he appeared to be talking to a rental company of some sort.  After a bit of back and forth he rang off just as I found an appropriate hat.  At that point it was simple to snag a scarf and jackets. 

“So?” I asked closing the cabinet and turning around.

“Some time ago a _Mr. Hoffman_ and a _Mr. Brodrick_ provided startup funds for a holiday rental business.  In exchange they get access to the properties whenever they request it.”

Interesting.  Once again it made a lot of sense.  Why own a specific location that would sit empty much of the time when you could have access to a rotating series of flats and houses.  The security would be top notch and the neighbors would be used to different people occupying the premises for a couple of days to a couple of weeks.  The only thing better for anonymity would be a high end hotel but Bond, like many of the 00’s was well known for using such places to hole up.  I suspected that this was at least one way the Bond and Trevelyan managed to stay under the radar in London.  Now hopefully the flat in question would have decent internet access.

Once again Bond continued as if reading my mind, “And all of them have direct internet access.”

I grinned, “What are we waiting for?”

“You to change jackets and put on that scarf,” was the reply.

I did and we were off again this time in the VW.

I was surprised at how quickly we arrived at our destination.  Bond didn’t take major evasive action as he had with the motorbike.  No this time he made what I realized later was only a minor detour to ensure that we were not currently being tailed.  It was only about 20 minutes before Bond was looking for parking. 

“The only problem with this set-up,” he remarked as he pulled into a just vacated space, “is that many of the properties don’t have a garage.”

“Could be useful if they haven’t made your vehicle,” I replied, “you wouldn’t get blocked in.”

“I tend to prefer keeping the car off the street; less likely to be randomly spotted by someone.  I also feel it’s better to have transport easy to hand in case you need to move quickly.  If they’ve tracked you to a safe-house then you have bigger problems.”  Bond paused for a moment, “In that case you are probably leaving via a window and ditching the car anyway.”

I had to smile to myself at that one.  The number of times 007 had managed to escape using creative defenestration, either his own or someone else’s, was legion.

“Just refrain from throwing me out said window and I’ll be happy,” I replied as we unloaded.

Bond led us around the corner and over a half block to a nice looking walk up, no different from any of its neighbors.  Like many buildings in London this block had originally been a set of row houses that had been divided up into flats at some point.  I could tell by looking that someone had done a major renovation job on this bit of the block only a few years ago.

Bond slid aside a cover on a box cleverly made to match the trim revealing a keypad.  He punched in a number and I heard the lock click open.  

I didn’t quite know what I had been expecting when Bond said _holiday rental company_ but what I walked into was a tastefully furnished flat.  The quality was mid to high range hotel, not luxury but comfortable.

“There should be a binder in the sitting room,” Bond directed.  “It will have the basic internet access information.  If you need the router or the connection itself you are on your own.”

Bond continued on to make a circuit of the flat, checking security and making sure we were alone.  I found the binder and took a quick look at the information.  Internet was via cable modem with wi-fi which meant the modem and the router would be somewhere on the line to the television.  It was a matter of moments to find both in the TV cabinet.  Even better I discovered that someone had etched a series of numbers into the back of the modem.  That would, I suspected, get me into the setup program without my having to hack it.  Thank heavens for small favors.  I unpacked my gear in the dining nook and got down to work.

Bond proceeded to organize and repack most of our shared resources in the sitting room.  Once he’d finished with that job he proceeded to clean his gun.  Despite appearing engrossed in his self-appointed tasks he would stop every 45 minutes or so and prowl around the flat. 

After the latest round of prowling Bond inquired “You have a stopping spot?”

“10 minutes.”

“I’m ordering takeaway, any preferences?”

“Anything but pizza,” I replied.

I heard Bond on the landline.  It sounded like Indian was the cuisine du jour.  That was followed shortly by the sounds of water and a kettle.  A mug of tea appeared next to my left hand.  I grunted my thanks. 

By the time I had finished up the food had arrived and I was ready for a break.  I stood up, stretched and holstered the pistol that I’d left sitting on the right side of the laptop while I’d been working. 

“Do I want to know?” Bond asked indicating the firearm and its holster on the table.

“Mental focus trick,” I replied as we adjourned to the sitting room and food.

I wondered if Bond was insulted that I’d seemingly not trusted in his ability to protect me.  I expected some allusion to that but was a bit surprised that Bond didn’t immediately follow up.  Instead he handed me an already made up plate.  It was only after I’d managed to eat most of it that he broached the subject again.

“Generally when a pistol is pointed at me I become very focused indeed,” he remarked.  “However I’m of the opinion that wasn’t your intent.”

“It’s a technique I developed early on when I realized that I had a tendency to lose track of what was going on around me,” I explained.  “I keep something in my peripheral vision to remind me to remain aware of my surroundings.  The particular item used and its placement tell me exactly how much concentration I can afford.”

“Do you often feel the need to use a firearm Q?”

“Not recently.  Not in the branch.”

Given what Bond knew of my history I suspected he would be able to determine exactly when and in what circumstances it had been necessary. 

“But,” I continued, “I can’t use it for the next bit.”

I looked over at him.  I hoped he’d get where I was going without a lot of explanation.

“So what exactly are you going to be doing that requires your full concentration?”

“An excursion into the dark web,” I replied.  “This whole situation has the earmarks of being the tip of an iceberg.  I need to go poke around and see if there are hints of anything big going on.”

Bond looked thoughtful at that, “The internet equivalent of infiltrating the Sicilian Mafia then.”

I remembered that mission: A simple intelligence gathering exercise that took a left turn when Bond had stumbled across an assassination plot against a sitting head of state. 

“Good analogy,” I replied.

“How long do you think you’ll need?”

“A couple hours to start; I need to reactivate and reestablish Pestilence.  Then I’ll see what I can find.”

Bond sighed, “And you complain about me overusing the _Bond_ legend when you are masquerading on line as one of the four horseman of the apocalypse?”

I smiled, “Not masquerading 007.  I earned that title and no one else has had the chops to claim it since.”

Bond muttered something that sounded like _cocky hackers_ under his breath then asked, “So what do you need me to do besides the obvious?”

I was pleased that he had asked.  It meant that he was taking me seriously as a full and capable member of the enterprise as opposed to the last time I had found myself under his watchful eye.  We then proceeded to discuss ways to get my attention without interrupting and set up a variety of contingency measures.  With all that and dinner out of the way I moved back to the dining nook and commenced my dive into the bowels of cyberspace.

An indeterminate time later I surfaced and stretched.  Given how I felt and the state of my bladder it had been quite some time. 

“A little after three hundred,” said Bond as he handed me a cup of tea when I finally wandered into the Kitchen.  “You find anything?”

“Nothing about that,” my eyes went to the hilt of the sword that I could see poking over his left shoulder in its makeshift sheaf and baldric “but I did run across some other interesting stuff.”

“Do tell.”

“Well it’s been quiet for the last couple of weeks.  Only the usual identity theft, phishing expeditions and scams are active.  Most of the high level black hats are lying low because the FBI managed to find and plug their leak.”

“What kind of leak and does it affect us?”

“Oh the cousins have had a low level inside leaker for a while.  They’ve been using it to plant information,” I explained.  “They weren’t too worried about it until he upped his game and finagled his way into some top secret files.  It was something related to the CIA’s black ops programs and had some sort of tie into the state department.  They didn’t even realize he’d snagged it until they got hacked by Radical Ed.”

“Radical Ed?” Bond looked confused.

I supposed I’d better explain, “Radical Edward the Forth is a quasi-grey hat hacker.  He gets his kicks getting into anything and everything then leaving notes on how to improve security.  The story I got was that Radical Ed hacked NCIS and realized that someone had been in before him.  He back traced it into DOD and realized that the same hacker had been in the CIA’s servers.  He dumped his findings on NCIS and they looped the FBI in.  The resultant shit storm made everyone and their brother decide to lay low for a bit.”

“From what Felix has mentioned,” Bond commented, “the FBI can get a little over enthusiastic at times.  Although there’s a guy I’ve met in their Washington office who is decently subtle.”

I let that one go and continued, “The leak was selling candidate vetting lists for some kind of black ops controller position.  The U.S. was trying to fill one of these positions and apparently they don’t just limit their vetting to in house sources they also ask allied nations to see if the candidates pop up in their data.  The hacker not only got their current candidate list but also some older lists from other countries when they were trying to fill a similar position.”

“They didn’t bother to destroy the old lists?  I thought their security protocols were better than that?”

“Oh they did but they just deleted it and didn’t wipe the free space.  That particular drive isn’t used much so the hacker was able to recover a bunch of the old lists.”

Bond looked puzzled, “And this is relevant because?”

“Well I had to hack the CIA for that one.  I found out that one of the old lists was ours.  It was over five years old but they still sent out an alert that it was released.  What’s really interesting,” I added, “is that the alert doesn’t go to anyone in MI 5 or through me.  It goes to some strange international cooperation division of the Home Office that I’ve never heard of before.” 

“Your brother then?” Bond asked.

“Surprisingly no.  Some low level guy named Kirkland who is nominally under my brother.”

“So what makes this Kirkland fellow so important that he is the contact for a leak of potentially obsolete information?”  Bond mused half to himself.

“That’s the next step,” I admitted.  “I need to find anything and everything about one Arthur Kirkland.”

**Author's Note:**

> For those of you familiar with the 2.5 Holmes ‘Verse this is the original plot bunny spawned when I started beta reading [Erif_Of_Taloma's](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Erif_Of_Taloma/pseuds/Erif_Of_Taloma) (Kneoria on FF.net) [MIA: Missing in America](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4076104). Despite being the first of many ideas engendered by that effort I found that I couldn’t tell this tale without having some background in place. Thus, the rest of what has become 2.5 Holmes' Verse is, at least in part, an effort to get back to the original idea that started the whole endeavor. I hope you enjoy.


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